GUERRILLA ATTACKS REPORTED ACROSS CHECHNYA

Russian military sources reported on July 13 that four servicemen and a police officer were injured when a blast hit an armored column in Chechnya’s Shali district, RIA Novosti reported. The incident reportedly took place as five armored personnel carriers and two Ural trucks ferrying Interior Ministry Interior Troops were driving near the village of Agishty. A mine was apparently detonated by remote control. On July 12, a sergeant serving on a contract basis was killed near the village of Kharsenoi in the Shatoi district when a group of army soldiers on a reconnaissance mission came under fire. RIA Novosti reported on July 10 that one serviceman was killed and nine wounded when two Interior Ministry vehicles came under fire from rocket-propelled grenades and automatic weapons in Grozny’s Staropromyslovsky district. Moskovsky komsomolets reported on July 11 that rebels had claimed that 15-20 Russian servicemen were killed and an equal number wounded in that incident. Novye izvestia reported on July 11 that Imran Kaimov, a policeman in the Shelkovskoi district settlement of Kargalinskaya, was shot to death by two people who drove up to him on bicycles and opened fire with automatic weapons.

The Chechen branch of the Federal Security Service (FSB) reported on July 11 that a former police officer suspected of connections with militants was arrested in the village of Alkhan-Kala, Itar-Tass reported. According to the news agency, FSB operatives and Russian troops had discovered two arms caches in Grozny and one in the village of Taskhkala that included blocks of TNT, large amounts of ammunition (including grenades for grenade launchers), batteries for makeshift explosive devices and four radio transmitters. The Interior Ministry’s headquarters in the North Caucasus announced on July 9 that it had arrested a participant in the 1995 raid on a hospital in the southern Russian town of Budennovsk, which was led by Chechen rebel warlord Shamil Basaev and in which more than 100 people died. Channel One television reported that 20 people involved in the Budennovsk raid have been arrested and more than 30 have been “liquidated” since the 1995.